Former Red Bull driver Liam Lawson gave a strong endorsement of the team’s choice of Laurent Mekies as its new team principal.
Red Bull announced two weeks ago it had appointed Mekies in place of Christian Horner with immediate effect.
Lawson drove for Red Bull in the first two rounds of the season before being demoted to their second F1 team, Racing Bulls. Mekies was team principal at Racing Bulls before being called up to Red Bull.
“I think he’ll do great,” Lawson told the official Formula 1 channel. “He’s somebody who cares a lot, a very, very good human being.
“I’ve loved working with him. Obviously I would love to work with him again in the future in some way. For Red Bull I think it’s a great opportunity for them to have Laurent there.”
Racing Bulls have promoted Alan Permane, who joined them from Alpine last year, as Mekies’ replacement.
“For us having Alan who’s obviously been in the team now for a couple of years with us it’s perfect, honestly,” said Lawson. “So for us I think it’s exciting, on my side nothing really changes.”
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Lawson’s team mate Isack Hadjar, admitted he was disappointed by the change.
“When it was announced I was on the sim. So it was quite disappointing to be honest, when I heard the news, because I had a great relationship with him. I still have, I still will, but it’s just a bit sad for every team member because he was very appreciated. But I’m very happy for him and his new mission now.”
Hadjar made his F1 debut this year and Permane will be the second team principal he has worked with. He described Mekies as “very performance-obsessed.”
“Going into Formula 1, I didn’t expect the team director to be this close. Obviously he has an engineering background, so this is obviously helpful, and he was really relevant in everything he was saying. So I found him very close to me, and the working relationship was great.
“But now with Alan it’s going to be exactly the same because they were very close together. So to me it’s just not having Laurent around that changes, but the rest nothing.”
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